Heather Eats Peanut Butter Again

by HEAB on June 1, 2010

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Yesterday, I finished off our last pint of dairy-free ice-cream, and I’ve decided not to buy anymore for a while. Nothing against buying ice-cream, it’s just that I’ve spent way too much money on it lately. That stuff is NOT cheap! However, we do like to re-use the containers as dog toys.

I have a savory waffle recipe that I really want to try, but this morning, I woke up craving something sweet. Oatmeal or cereal didn’t sound good. Nope, I wanted ice-cream, but there was none to be found in our freezer. So, I made my own. Taking a cue from Katie, I blended 1 cup unsweetened chocolate almond milk, 1 large banana, 2 TBSP crunchy peanut butter, and 1 packet of hot cocoa mix in the Vita-Mix. This was the first time I’ve used nut butter in over 3 months. I still don’t want any straight-up, but I knew it would taste good blended in the ice-cream. Then instead of freezing it overnight, I simply added 1/2 tsp guar gum, 1/4 tsp xanthan gum, and 17 ice cubes and then blended some more.

The recipe made a huge bowl of chocolate banana peanut butter soft serve, and it was quite filling and so delicious! Thanks for the inspiration Katie!

The next part of today’s post really has nothing to do with food, but I thought you might find it exciting. Melissa from The Cisco What If Your TV Could? Video Contest contacted me last week, and wanted to offer one lucky HEABer the chance to win this cool Flip Camera. All you have to do is leave me a comment below telling me if your TV could do anything, what would you like it to do? If you choose to do so, you can also film your answer and submit it here for a chance to win the grand prize of $10,000.

Here is my answer: Radley, our little baby girl pup pictured above, is scared to death of thunderstorms. When one hits, and neither CD and I are home, I feel so bad. So, if my TV could do anything, I would love for it to turn on loud before the first thunder clap occurs (it should know the storm is about to come because of the weather channel ), and then call Radley into the room. It would then spend the entire storm showing nothing but squirrels and bunnies running across the screen. Radley LOVES her squirrels and bunnies, and hopefully that would keep her mind off the weather.

So, what would you like your TV to do? Again, leave your answer in a comment below for a chance to win a Flip Camera provided by the kind folks at Cisco.

totally taking the food thing too. I would like it to make me some yummy food. or Mary’s idea, of being a portal TO the yummy food and beautiful travel places. and organize me. I want it to be my personal home organizing slave.

Awwwwwwwww, HEAB!! What a sweet answer, love it!! If my TV could do anything I would want it to be interactive. Like I could hop in and go to tropical islands and eat all the yummy food from cooking shows!

Well, I have been saying this for years, but I wish my TV had smell-o-vision. I hate when the chefs on the Food Network say, “I wish you could smell this… it smells sooo good” because I DO want to smell it!!!!! It would also help me to decide if it was somethind that might appeal to me, before I went out and bought all the ingredients to make it myself!

That “ice cream” sounds awesome! What a tasty creation. Glad the nut butter is back in your life!! I am going to reuse my answer from Gina’s blog- I would want my tv to allow me to add my feedback in on American Idol

I would like my TV to magically transport from our bedroom to living room when I don’t feel like moving it! (I often move it into the bedroom when I need help falling asleep if the fiance is out of town!)

Neat – …um, well, I’d like my TV to show whatever show I feel like watching at that time…but I guess that’s why they have TiVo’s now…but I don’t have one – so I think my answer still counts !?…oh and rewind when I miss something…which is often because I’m always multi-tasking…

So, either A) I am using too much or B) I just don’t like gums, because I added about 1/4 tsp of xantham gum in my smoothie a few days ago and it just tasted WEIRD. Do you think the xantham and guar gums need each other to balance out?

As for the TV question, I wish my TV could tell me I’ve spent too much time watching trashy reality TV or Law & Order and to go be productive.

LOL when I first saw your title, I thought you’d changed your blog name! I was scared!
Your hot chocolate ice cream sounds amazing; you have the best ideas!
Speaking of good ideas: I’ve always said I would like a computer where you can take what you want off the screen. So I’d like a tv where you could do that too .

Oh, and poor Henry shakes like a leaf and hides in the closet during storms

I would want my tv to know what i wanted to watch before i even changed the channel and do it for me (the solution to losing the remote control!) and of course, it better know that i was to smell and taste all the yummy food that it shows me!

Hmm, I’d love my tv to find random cooking shows/recipes, record them, categorize them by category, and then give me a little quiz to figure out what kind of food I’m in the mood for! Because sometimes I can’t decide what I want to eat so I’d want my tv to guide me through the process I’m lazy sometimes with the food…

oooooh i wish my tv could keep my sampson dog calm during a storm too. he’s also terribly scared of thunder. i hate when he’s home alone and it’s storming. i also wish my tv could make me breakfast… or that ice cream you posted… or maybe instruct sampson dog how to prepare the meals and have them ready when i get home. really there are so many things that tv could be doing other than sitting there begging to swallow my time.

Ohhh, I love your answer for the TV to help your dog, best answer for sure!
If my TV could do something I wish it would be to tell my husband to turn that thing off and stop watching so many series…. really, he watches all the CSIs and a bunch of other nonsense, plus he spends most of the week watching sports, sitting in front of the TV. I wish the TV could tell him to turn itself off and go have fun with the family!
(Can you tell I am not a big TV person??)
On the other hand, if it could not shut it off then I wish it could play always new episodes of the cooking shows I like so I don’t have to miss the new ones and always watch the repeats!
Man, that is a cool camera, I so want one of those!
Ana

Right now I would just love for my TV to get some channels, I can’t afford it! But of course I would love to be able to hop through the TV to all those exotic locations or snatch yummy food/ cool clothes off of it!

I wish my tv would show me more of those loveable, 30-minute, family-friendly sitcoms like Full House, Who’s The Boss, Family Matters or Step by Step. I miss those shows, but thank goodness for syndication!

I would love it if my TV could maintain the same volume ALL THE TIME. I know that commercials are generally louder than the program running but even the sound within the program itself can vary widely. Since I have a 2 year old in bed at night I hate having to keep changing the volume so I can hear people talking then get blown away by bursts of loud noise (gunfire, waves, car chases, etc)

I think it would be cool if my TV would recommend shows that I might like… some internet radio sites give recommendations based on my preferences so it would be cool to find new shows this way. “If you like ‘The Simpsons’, you might like …”!

TV?
Oh the background noise maker…
I guess a movement sensor so it could do its job only when i’m around, i wouldn’t worry about turning it on and off. WHy do i have cable when i haven’t watched a show in i don’t remember when..
Ha

If my TV could do anything for me, I’d probably ask that it make time stand still. I love mornings when I’m watching Good Morning America before I get out of bed. That quiet time is so relaxing, but short lived because time goes to fast and before I know it I’m dragging myself off to get ready for work.

I wish my TV would know instantly what I want to watch depending on my mood… a good film, trashy reality tv, something funny – and even tell me when I´m supposed to be doing something else. Commercial free of course. That would be awesome!!!

Hahaha, this is fun! If my tv could do anything, I would want it to have a built-in camera kind of like the one on my laptop (does this already exist and I just don’t know about it?). That way I could turn it on to record when I am doing yoga in the living room and play it back later to check out how I am doing on the poses. And I would turn it on when I was gone all day to record my puppy and see what he REALLY does while we are at work!!!

It would be great if my tv did either 1) allow me to print off any recipe I am watching someone cook on tv (example watching Rachel Ray, push a button and there is the recipe for what she is cooking) or 2)allow me to sync my calendar to it so if I loose track of time while watching tv I will not miss any appointments becaue it would pop up on the screen in the middle of a show.

I wish I could have a tv that tells me what to make and how to make it by using the ingredients I already have in my house. Each week I could tell it what I bought at the store. I love to cook, but never know what the family will like and I don’t have time to pre-plan because you never know what night you might have leftovers or that the husband ate a late lunch and isn’t hungry, etc.

YAY for peanut butter!!
If my TV could do anything, I would want it to be like those cruise ship TVs that show you pictures of the front of the boat and tourists taking pictures. Except instead of pictures of the boat, I would want pictures from all over the world, from the top of a mountain to under the ocean!!!

YAY for peanut butter!!
If my TV could do anything, I would want it to be like those cruise ship TVs that show you live pictures of the front of the boat and tourists taking pictures. Except instead of pictures of the boat, I would want real live pictures from all over the world, from the top of a mountain to under the ocean!!!

It would be awesome if two people could somehow watch the same thing at once… not split screen exactly, but maybe if they wore goggles or something and each person would watch something different at the same time.

That way, I could watch The Bachelorette while my husband watches the Stanly Cup game without having to be in two different rooms, like we did last night

I have been sitting here wondering how I can make really good vegan ice cream at home without a blender and then I came to this post and somehow it reminded me I actually have an ice cream maker. I am an idiot.

Anyway, I say this because I’m probably totally gonna steal your above recipe to make me some ice cream ASAP.

I’m just like most of the people who say they wish they could reach into the TV and take out the meals! I mean, seriously, I’ve dreamed about that possibility ever since I read Willy Wonka. I mean, in the book you can get a BAR OF CHOCOLATE with Wonkavision. HELL YES PLEASE. Of course, I don’t even have a tv so I guess I can’t really hope my tv does much of anything.

If my TV could do anything it would edit out all commercials without having to DVR shows and fast forward through them. Also have an on demand service for all episodes of my favorite shows available when ever I like. Especially the entire series of Arrested Development and It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia.

Oh sweet Heather, your comment on my post this morning just reinforced why I admire and love you so much! To be completely honest, you are one of my biggest inspirations in terms of forging a more healthy relationship with my body and nourishing it properly, so thank you for being such a positive influence on my life!

I am ecstatic that you were feeling the PB love this morning!! Ice cream for breakfast is, indeed, the best thing since sliced bread.

Ok, so I am jumping on the bandwagon with people who want it to teleport me to the awesome places I see (for free). But in reality? I would just like a really solid, intuitive, and bug free DVR type functionality. One that never accidentally loses the recording of the show I want to see, one that never complains that I have too much recording at once, and one that I can watch shows in any room on any TV. Netflix/Hulu service built in would be supergreat too.

in all honesty i would like to be able to turn my tv off and on…if i want it to just play a dvd or vhs (ah yeah, i still have one) i have to leave it on for at least 24hrs of pure fuzz before a picture will appear.

if i had a tv that would actually work, i would love to have a transport button where i could pop into a show that i was watching if i wanted to be there!!!

If my TV could do anything I would want it to Turn itself off 10 minutes after I fall asleep. I don’t want to set a timer, I want it to intuitively know when I have fallen asleep so it doesn’t wake me up later

If my TV could do anything, I would want to be able to “work from home” — literally! I’d want to be able to physically interact with the people and objects at my office from the comfort of my house. How cool would that be? No more commute! YAY!

Well, I know they do have some programs for learning..but I wish TV can have a feature that would have an interactive encyclopedia – so you can actually learn and become smarter rather than watching reality tv celebrity garbage.

I loved this post. I agree with all the above ideas, and I thought the ones about food were especially creative. In addition, I would like for my tv to make politicians be instantly accessible to me for questioning. I would say, “What do you mean you are going to do or not do something you said you were going to do when I voted for you? Well, buddy, you’ve got some serious ‘splainin’ to do!” It probably wouldn’t change things much, but I bet it would really cut down on tv time for politicians to make speeches and maybe stop a lot of the ‘spin’. Boy, am I dreaming today!

I don’t even have a TV, but if I did I would want it to be my own personal version of “What not to wear” in my own closet. I would want it to give me fashion advice (“you’re wearing THAT to work?!”). I am not the snappiest dresser and I would love for my my would-be TV to really help me spruce things up!

I think I am ready to make my own “soft serve” at home. I’ve been wanting to for, I don’t know, forever and there is really no reason to not at least try. Except I’ll go for the non-chocolate/cocoa variety.

Oh, and if my TV could do anything, I’d want it to make itself flat, about 200lbs. lighter, and come into the next century with the rest of us.

I would def like smell-o-vision….no better yet taste-o-vision since I am obsessed with food/travel channel YUMMMMMMMMMMM! I would also like to basically just step into my tv and be where ever Anthony Bourdain happens to because a) I love him , b) hellooo who doesn’t want to travel the world’s most exotic locations?, c) more eating!!.

I wish my TV could be a source of income. I would like my TV to make money for me so I don’t have to do it myself. I’m not sure how this would be possible, but I would make sure my TV tells people that I accept cash, credit or personal cheque

I wish my TV would let me jump right in so that I could experience first hand all the cool things that often go on in TV land. Go to the fabulous places on the Travel Channel, sample all the goodies on the Food Network, heck… jump right into the summer concerts going on in Rockefeller Center during the Today Show. I would love it!

I wish that my TV only showed the funny commercials like the Orbit “lint licker” commercial or heart warming commercials like the Google superbowl ad. This TV wouldn’t show any negative commercials, political adds, or poorly made local car ads with talking dogs.

Hmm… if my TV could do anything, it would allow me to change channels with my MIND! My remote control is broken, I keep forgetting to buy a new one, and it’s so annoying to have to get up to change the channel!

Emily, yep, she’s our little Boo Radley. We named her in memory of another puppy we had that was hit by a car. His name was Scout – still miss him, but we’re so thankful to have Radley. It’s a great name.

ok, being honest, i don’t watch tv. i hate it. i think most of the programs are gross and yucky. and the commercials are horrible. you watch a show or a movie, and then the commercials come on BLARING and you have to dive for the remote to turn it down. i just gave up! so if i watch tv ever again, i would like my tv to regulate commercial noise.

in the meantime, i would LOVE my tv to hook up to my computer so i could read the HEAB blog on the BIG SCREEN!!

I would like my TV to get it’s real estate license and sell my house. I have shown my house 66 times since the 1st of the year. (it’s been a real parade of people thru here!) And dropped the price a huge, ridic sum. You dont even want to know how bad it is in this real estate market. Dear TV, please, please sell my house for me!

Averie, Been there – I feel your pain. Last year, our house was on the market for 8 months – tons of showings, and not one offer. They would call at last minute and keeping things clean with 2 hairy dogs was next to impossible, and then I had to get the dogs of out of the house whenever they called. Some days it would be raining, and I would just drive around aimlessly with both dogs in the back seat. I’m so sorry as I know the market in Phoenix is BAD. Sending you house selling vibes!!!

If my TV could do anything, I would want it to be able to let me go up to the screen and enter the show if I felt I wanted to, so that I could change the outcome of the show if I didnt like how it was going. For example, on a show called Army Wives, one of the wives just had a miscarriage and I would want to be able to go in and make that NOT happen!!

Smell ‘o’ vision. I wish I could smell the delicious goodness that is going on in Food Network kitchens. I watch it so much that it would be nice to fill my house with home cooked meal smells when I don’t feel like cooking.

I’ve had a variation of this “ice cream” for breakfast at least 4 or 5 times a week now for several weeks. I love being able to have chocolate ice cream as breakfast! Especially now that we’re reaching close to 100 degrees most days.
I love your answer for the tv question! So cute!
I can’t think of much, though I do wish I had HBO and could also tvo things. It would also be cool to be able to play music on it, or even skype with people and have it look like they’re in the room!

I wish my TV could become a surrogate boyfriend mirror. If I asked it “do I look fat in these jeans” it would tell me the truth, only NICELY and say something like “I think you look MUCH better in the black jeans” or “You look SO much thinner than you did last week”. : )

I was going to say smell but everyone already did! I guess I wish there was less of a barrier between what happens on tv and the watcher. Like you could participate in game shows or help solve the puzzle in a mystery movie!

If my TV could do anything…..I’d be able to say out loud any show or movie I wanted to watch at that moment. It wouldn’t even matter if the show is old and not on air anymore!
It basically would allow me to re-watch all the old show from my childhood!

I’am a total “foodie” so my request would be- I wish my TV had more food channels and I could push a button and the food I select would slide out….all personal chef like
That would make me a happy girl! Infact when I read your blog, I always wish I could taste your creations! CD is a lucky guy!